


The Captain and the Doctor

by aubreykae07



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Bucky Barnes Returns, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, Nightmares, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-25
Updated: 2015-05-25
Packaged: 2018-04-01 06:01:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,216
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4008559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aubreykae07/pseuds/aubreykae07
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve was just a kid from Brooklyn.<br/>Ali was just a scientist from Russia.<br/>But for some reason, it was a whole lot more complicated then that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Captain and the Doctor

March 2002

Clint Barton was rudely awaken by the shrill ringing coming from his cell phone, at a time that Clint deemed an ungodly hour. The fact that he and Natasha had just returned from a mission that previous day only worsened that fact. Groaning, Clint rolled over to see who dared to awaken him this early.  
Director Fury, Clint sighed, well the day can only go downhill from here.  
“This is Barton,” he finally answered. As much as he wanted to, he knew from past experience, that evading Fury’s calls who only end in agents storming his SHIELD borrowed room.  
“Barton, my office in 20.” Was the director’s curt response.  
“Well hello to you too sir,”  
“Just get your ass down here Barton.” And with that Fury ended the call.  
Knowing once again from experience to avoid summons to HQ, Clint forced himself up from his bed and stumbled into to the shower. After drying off and dressing, Clint poured himself a strong cup of coffee and headed to Fury’s office.

 

“You wanted to see me sir?” asked Clint  
“Yes,” Director Fury said “We've recently intercepted some rather interesting intel from Russia that may come of interest to you.”  
“And you want me to confirm it?”  
“No, we've already got that part covered.”  
“Then how does this pertain to us exactly?”  
The director responded by handing Clint a case file. Raising an eyebrow, Clint opened the file, far too tired to deal with the vague answers he was getting.  
“Holy shit,” muttered Clint as he skimmed the papers, “He’s alive? You said Barney was dead!”  
“All of our intel said he was, but apparently he’s just been hiding out in Russia all these years.”  
“So you want me to what? Take him out?”  
“No he poses no real threat now any ways, and based of his entanglements with the Russian mafia I think he’ll get what’s been coming to him for a while. We’re more interested in his daughter.”  
“His daughter…” Clint was stunned. He just could not picture his brother with a kid, let alone a daughter.  
“Alianovna Volkov, from what we can tell, she’s a genius with an IQ that rivals Stark and Banner. Unfortunately your jack-ass of a brother realized just how much of a genius she was and took advantage of it.”  
Director Fury paused, taking a moment to pull up multiple images on the holoscreen in front of him. Images of lab experiments, his brother, leaders of the Russian mafia, and young girl that Clint assumed to be his niece.  
The girl appeared to be around 13 years old or so. She had dark red curly hair that fell to her waist, which stood out in stark contrast from her porcelain skin and jade green eyes. Her large, wide set doe eyes made her look innocent, far too innocent to be in such a situation. Clint suddenly felt inexplicably guilty for her experience, even though she had no clue of her existence.  
“Barney was having a bit of issues with the mafia, so naturally the first solution to come out of his twisted little mind was use his daughter to get them off his back. He basically sold her mind. In exchange for the mafia not killing him, your lovely brother handed over his daughter to some underground, black market research team focusing on recreating the effects of Project Rebirth.”  
“So basically,” Clint started, trying to process everything, “your saying supposedly dead brother sold his kid off to some deranged scientists to try to recreate the super human serum?”  
Fury nodded.  
“What is plain unsettling is how close she’s getting. A 13 year old girl is closer than any of the world’s top researchers, and of course she’s your damn niece.”  
“Were getting her out right?” Clint demanded. There was no way he was leaving here there.  
“Damn right we are. That’s your mission. You and Romanoff go in there get her out and then blow the damned place up. Your plane leave at 1800 hours.”  
Clint offered the director a curt nod before exiting the office and staking off to find his partner.

 

“This is sick,” dead panned Natasha, “even in our line of work.”  
“You got that right. This is low, even for Barney.” Mumbled her partner. The pair were now in route to a remote village outside of Kiev to retrieve Clint’s niece, Clint flying and Natasha idly flipping through the pages of the case file.  
Clint could tell by the distant look in her eyes that she sympathized with the young girl. Both were young Russian girls, ripped away from the childhood they deserved, and taken advantage of for their abilities. Not to mention the uncanny physical similarities between the two.  
“I’m still trying to wrap my head around you taking care of kid.”  
“Wait, what?”  
“Didn't you read the damn file,” Natasha asked, “Mom died in childbirth and your brother is in the running for the worst father of the year that leaves you as guardian, unless you’d rather put her in foster care.”  
“Damn, didn't think of that.”  
“I wouldn't worry too much about it. I mean she seems like she’s already going to be pretty grown up, and SHIELD will probably want to keep her on base, at least for a while given her abilities.”  
Clint pondered for a moment before letting out a long sigh, “Still.”  
“You’ll do fine,” Natasha assured,” It’s not like you haven’t taken in young Russian refugees before.”  
He gave his partner a weary smile before turning his attention back to the controls of the quin-jet, the two remaining in comfortable silence for the remainder of the trip.

 

A few hours later, the infamous duo found themselves on the outskirts of Kiev, geared up and ready to set their plan in motion. Despite having done missions of this nature hundreds of times prior, Clint was nervous. It wasn't the rescue mission itself that put Clint on edge, but rather, who they were rescuing. And even more so, her father.  
“You ready?” Natasha asked, eyebrow raised, clearly picking up on his nerves.  
“As I’ll ever be,” he responded strapping his quiver to his back, “let’s go kick some ass shall we?”  
Natasha smirked, “Lets.”  
The security surrounding the compound was laughable, especially considering the fact that this facility contained some of the brightest, on earth. Quietly Clint and Natasha made their way to the air ducts. Because their primary goal was to rescue Alianovna, this was the surest way to get to the labs with as little gunfire as possible.  
Not that either minded shooting any of these bastards.  
It took about ten minutes of crawling through the ventilation to reach the portion of the building where the labs were clustered, and another five to find the specific lab the young scientist were being held. But eventually, the pair found themselves above the lab holding the presumed Alianovna, fortunately alone.  
Clint wasted no time silently removing the grate and Natasha dropped down to the floor. They had already previously decided that it would be better for Natasha to do the initial talking, considering the similarities between the two, and the fact that her Russian was far better than Clint’s.  
The moment Natasha’s feet touched the ground however, she was pinned to the floor, a gun pressed to her temple. Quite certain that they had already swept the area for guards, that left only one person to be her captor.  
Once the reality of the situation set in, Natasha immediately shot a look at Clint, who was staring down at her dumbstruck, a look that clearly said keep your dumb ass out of this!  
“Who are you?” the girl demanded in Russian, “Who do you work for!”  
“My name is Agent Natasha Romanoff, I work for SHIELD. We've come to take you to a safer place.” Natasha responded in an even, cool tone.  
“That’s what they said.” Alianovna spat, “Look how that turned out.”  
Sensing that the young girl would neither budge nor shoot, Natasha turned her head slightly to face the trembling child that currently held the upper hand.  
“Alianovna,” Natasha said slowly, “We don’t want to hurt you, and we don’t want your research either. We just want to get you out of here, to a place where they can’t control you. I just need you to put down the gun.”  
Natasha could tell by the sudden pain in her eyes that she was close to getting her to leave.  
“Why should I trust you?” Alianovna asked in a trembling voice.  
“Because I've been where you've been- used for my abilities against my will, wanting nothing more than to free from the control. Please, just let me show you.” Natasha pleaded. “And I have someone who I think you’ll be interested to meet.”  
Seeing that she was gaining the girls interest, Natasha continued.  
“Did your father ever tell you about your uncle?” Natasha asked.  
“He said he died, a long time ago in a fire,” was Alianovna’s whispered response.  
“I can assure you he’s very much alive.”  
At that moment Clint dropped down beside Natasha hoping she didn't hold a gun to his head as well. The physical similarities between Clint and his brother were apparent, so he was hoping that seeing the resemblances would convince Alianovna to leave with them while they still had the chance.  
Alianovna stared at her uncle wide eyed, her gun clattering to the floor.  
“Oh, god. It is you. You look just like him.” She muttered. “Okay, okay I believe you.”  
Her glance fleeted between Clint and Natasha.  
“I can really leave?” she asked in a low voice.  
Clint offered his niece a weak smile and nodded. Immediately Alianovna spun into action, holstering her gun and gathering papers and hard drives that littered the room, shoving them into a leather bag. A few moments later stopped in front of the pair with a bag slung over her shoulder.  
“Don’t want the KGB getting their hands on these do we.” Alianovna asked as she jumped up onto one of the nearby lap benches and pulled herself into the same air vent Clint and Natasha used. All in one smooth motion, with a smirk on her face.  
“Well,” Natasha chuckled, “She is most definitely related to you.”

 

Due to the nature of his work, Clint had been in some pretty strange situations before, but nothing could have prepared him for this. There wasn't enough mission briefings in the world that could have prepared him for the rescue of his niece.  
He had learned a lot about Alianovna on their flight back to the SHIELD base in New York. She spoke 4 languages- and working on a fifth-, had an eidetic memory, was fairly efficient in both hand to hand combat as well as shooting, and was the top scientist in her field. Basically, she was brilliant.  
The strange part was, he hadn't really said much to his niece at all, he just eaves drooped on her conversations with Natasha. The two had hit it off immediately, which was surprising considering that Natasha was cold to pretty much everyone. But apparently, she had a soft spot for the young Russian scientist.  
Once Clint landed the quin-jet at HQ, the three filed off and were immediately greeted Phil Coulson. He immediately smiled at the small redhead who had strayed a bit, almost hiding behind Natasha.  
"Mrs. Volkov, it's nice to finely meet you. My names Phil Coulson, I work as Agents Romanoff and Barton's handler, so I'll be the one helping you settle in here."  
Alianovna looked at Coulson, before quickly glancing back at Natasha. Seeing the young girls distress, Natasha gave her a weak smile before muttering something in Russian, which Clint assumed was some form of reassurance.  
She moved out from behind Natasha and confidently walked up to Coulson, offering her hand to him.  
"Please, call me Ali. I am very grateful to be here." she introduced herself in English, laced with a thick Russian accent. Her ability to instantly put on a confident act didn't go unnoticed by the small group of agents.  
"Well on behalf of Director Fury, I'd like to offer you a position as a consultant to SHIELD. You'll get your own lab, state of the art equipment, what do say?"  
Ali looked at Coulson analytically.  
"You'll understand when I say say I am cautious to accept. I do not like to constrain my ideas. My last employer and I had many disagreements for this reason." Ali answered coolly.  
"I fully understand. As a consultant you have the freedom to work on anything you like. We only ask that you occasionally as it us in matters where the rest of our scientists are stumped." Coulson assured.  
Ali considered the offer for a moment. She knew her options where limited. She was a refugee, and would be in danger any place outside of SHIELD. If she accepted the offer she would have a chance to make discoveries that would be nearly impossible anywhere else, and protection from her past. She had Natasha- who she fully trusted- and her uncle, who she hadn't decided about. She could have a new start.  
"I... I accept." She answered.  
"Well Ms. Volkov, welcome to SHIELD."


End file.
